The present invention relates to data processing systems, and more specifically to the display of and interaction with local and remote data objects.
In a typical distributed data processing system, there are many situations where a user may need to display and interact with both local and remote data objects. Local and remote data objects may include, for example, files and folders located locally and remotely. Typical actions performed on these local and remote data objects may include, for example, editing, deleting, copying, moving, renaming, and in the case of program files and executable files, compiling and running.
Known data object viewers typically display either all local or all remote data objects in a single view. When interacting with remote data objects presented in such a view, two approaches have been commonly used. In a first approach, an action on a remote data object is invoked directly on the remote system, for example by programming a customized remote action. In a second approach, a remote data object is “pulled” or downloaded to a local system, acted upon locally, and then “pushed” or uploaded back to the remote system. For example, there are Windows-based code editors, which allow for local editing of remote files. Typically, this is done by downloading a temporary copy of the remote files to a local system, allowing the files to be edited locally, and then subsequently pushing the edited files back to the remote system.
It would be desirable to provide a more flexible approach to displaying and interacting with local and remote data objects.